Dungeons and Valleys

I almost left the teaching profession in May 2018. A two-year public and private gauntlet left me professionally disenchanted and discouraged. Several of my mentors, church family, and former students passed away in a short stretch of time. Relationally, I was distant. Mentally, I was absent. Spiritually, I was at war. My morale withered, and I felt distant and withdrawn in my relationships. By the end of May, I dreaded each day. I tried my best to rest in God’s immense provision and grace, love my family, feed my church, inspire my students, and be a good friend, but I felt inadequate in every regard. Before I knew it, the paved road of mountaintop joy weaved its way down into the unmarked trail through the valley of depression. Shadows, briars, and weeds consumed the path. It was as if towering black clouds, threatening their worst, hovered mockingly above the barren trees. No step felt easy. My heart felt tired, and a drab dungeon of gloom cast its shadow into every facet of my thinking. Like a dreadnought’s anchor resting upon my chest, fatigue nullified grit. And that’s how the school year almost ended. 

We closed the year with an 8th-grade banquet and slideshow. My plans were to wrap up the show, start packing up my things, wait until everyone was gone, and leave the keys on my desk. 

The God whose grace is sufficient, whose strength is made visible in our weakness, had other plans. He used three overlapping means- His word, His history, and His people- to turn my weary eyes back upon Him. 

God’s Word

During my seasons of depression, Scripture is my solace. That particular season, I took my time reading, studying, meditating, and praying through the Psalms. I found a true friend in the psalmists. They speak candidly about their struggles. They pray, sing, petition, praise, ponder, process, remember their history (failures and successes), and give thanks. They are brazenly authentic and raw. Psalm 42, one of the songs of the Sons of Korah, captivated my thoughts for days. It is desperate and vulnerable. Listen to how the psalmists speak: “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God… My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember, as I pour out my soul:… Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God… Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. By day the Lord commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life… Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God, for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. 

Note that the psalmist is still cast down at the end, yet he is still preaching to himself with hope and longing. The soul that is panting at the beginning is panting to the end and there is zero resolution. Yet hope and praise have the final word.

These truths were churning in my heart, mind, and soul.

Church History

At the same time, I was reading through the letters of Samuel Rutherford (1600-1661) for the first time. Writing to Lady Culross from exile in Aberdeen in 1636, he famously wrote, “I see that grace groweth best in winter.” Rutherford was a man who learned this lesson the hard way. He knew pain and loss and battled despair for extended seasons. But he also rested in Christ. He goes on to say in his letter, “I pray you, Madam, let me have that which is my prayer here, that my sufferings may preach to the four quarters of this land; and, therefore, tell others how open-handed Christ had been to the prisoner and the oppressed stranger. Why should I conceal it? I know no other way to glorify Christ but to make an open proclamation of His love and of his kindness to me in the furnace… Help me to pray and praise; but rather to praise and rejoice in the salvation of God. Grace, grace be with you.” Note that Rutherford is still in exile at the end of the letter, yet his disposition is set upon praise and glorifying God in his weaknesses. Grace has the final word.

These truths were churning in my heart, mind, and soul. 

His People

Enter the kindhearted, creative, teachable, brilliant, caring, humble, and Christ-loving Kensley Barron. After the 8th grade banquet and slideshow, she shyly gave me a folded note and politely asked that I not read it until she was gone. She gave me a quick side hug and said, “Goodbye, Mr. Murray.” 

After sending our students off, I walked to my room, sat at my desk, stared at the empty boxes, and took out the treasure that Kensley had given me. I unfolded her note and began to read. Storehouses of gold are worthless in comparison to her kind words. She encouraged and reminded me why I do what I do. I wept. A lot. Alone. For a while. With my face buried in my hands, I dried my eyes and sat there. The truths expressed throughout her letter churned in my heart, mind, and soul. Her thankfulness and encouragement had the final word. I walked to my filing cabinet.  

In grad school, one of my professors offered me wise counsel. She said there would be days, weeks, months, and sometimes years when we consider leaving the teaching profession. But feelings are fickle. They ebb and flow. They descend into the darkest abyss or rise into the highest heavens, often fueled by fleeting words or seasonal conditions. So she challenged us to buy a binder or box to store the items, drawings, letters, and trinkets that students give you over the years. When you fill it, buy a new binder or box. Repeat the process. On the days you feel like quitting, take out the binder or box. Read each note. Just do not budge until you’ve read each one. Think about your decision. Give it a day or two, a week or two, a month or two, or a year or two to think about what the verdict will mean for your family, students, and colleagues. 

So that’s what I did. The day of Kensley’s letter, I reached down into the filing cabinet and pulled out two binders of student notes. I read each and every one. When I finished, I closed the binder, put in Kensley’s letter, placed the binders back in the filing cabinet, kept my keys, and took the empty boxes to the dumpster.

Dungeons and Daisies

It is so easy to grow calloused and cold in this world. It is so easy to lose track of why we do what we do. Somewhere along the way, what I was doing eclipsed why I was doing it. This is a dangerous place to dwell. Purposeless passion dies in the desert of difficulty. Passionless purpose drains the well of inspiration dry. But when purpose and passion meet, the believer becomes like a traveling oasis in the valley of shadows. I learned from Kensley that it is possible, in a moment, to awaken a tired heart and weary gaze to the majesty of simple truths for those walking through desolate days.

One, Jesus never left. Nor did he simply see me or walk with me. The Good Shepherd who entered a far darker dungeon of despair carried me like a lost lamb upon his whip-torn back, upon which the imprint of Calvary’s cross will forever stand as an eternal trophy of the one who vanquished death. As many have said eloquently, there is no crown without the cross. The cross is inseparable from growing in Christlikeness, knowing that this momentary suffering is not worth comparing to the glory to be revealed in us.

Two, the unmarked trail through the valley of sadness was littered with the footprints of men like Samuel Rutherford, who had walked those trails long before me. If I would but listen, learn, and take heed of their course, I would see them endure until the golden rays of Splendor’s Gates welcomed them (and one day me) home beyond the valley, a place where faith becomes sight. 

Three, Kensley had a front-row seat to watch my journey. But she was never merely a spectator. She made observations, took notes, left her chair, and lifted my chin to see the glory of Christ working through his people. This is a wonderful picture of who the church is to be. In a very real way, her letter was a daisy in the dungeon, a torch in the valley. What could an 8th-grade student teach her teacher? Our weakness is a platform for God’s glory. Often, God’s bringing us to the end of ourselves is nothing less than his sanctifying, soul-empowering, endurance-building grace. His power is made perfect in our weakness.

In a world whose message is self-reliance, the gospel teaches the sufficiency of Christ. Jesus is our substitute, strength, and shield. Jesus is our rock, anchor, and king. It is to Christ we look, and in Christ we trust. And in him, we have this hope: that in our most desperate, dark, and distressing days, the Lamb who submitted Himself to death on our behalf is also the Lion who rose to vanquish the grave itself. In him, we have a sure hope and an anchor that holds. And if we genuinely care about our brothers and sisters and truly love one another as Christ loved us first, we must remind one another of these truths. We must lift the chins of weary saints to the beauty of the immortal Christ. We must take “daisies” to those in dungeons. Perhaps God will use that smallest act of faith (a one-page letter to a very discouraged teacher) to pierce the dark clouds that descend upon us in the valley so that the sun may shine through and remind us of the Light of the World. 

… for your progress and joy in the faith.